


A small piece of poetry

by linfanny



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Coffee Shops, Friendship/Love, Getting to Know Each Other, M/M, Mentioned Haiba Lev, Mentioned Yaku Morisuke, Writing, with a glimpse of Kagehina
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-07
Updated: 2017-01-07
Packaged: 2018-09-15 13:38:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9237470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/linfanny/pseuds/linfanny
Summary: Every customer of the small coffee shop, even those weird ones that his co-worker Shouyou loved the most, were all connected to a kind of routine Kozume Kenma could understand. Coffee before work, cappuccino between shifts, a quick breakfast before the morning class. Some of them chatted with each other, other just played on phone; a student worked with his laptop, and asked permission to charge it every time, even if Shouyou kept reassuring him he didn’t need to ask at all.Then there was the weird guy near the window. He just sat there, with his tea, his untouched notebook, and his pen, glancing around for hours.Kenma couldn’t remember when he started to notice him, when he started to be aware of him being there, staring in the void or out of the window; he couldn’t remember when he started to be interested into him. Because he was, Kenma admitted to himself.





	

Napkin #3

_I left you alone with your bag and your blank pages._

_I’ll came back when they’ll become butterflies._

[September]

 

If someone would ask him the reasons why he liked his work, Kozume Kenma would’ve listed them as followed:

  1. It was close to home;
  2. The pay was good;
  3. The customers were almost only workers or students, coming there for a quick drink before or between shifts, little apt to engage conversation with the barista - that would be him.



His friend Kuroo had laughed his ass off when he had told him he had got that job, like it had been an extremely lame joke. He was incredulous that Kenma - who generally tried to avoid human interaction like other people avoided puddles on a rainy day - had chosen a job that that would put him in forced contact with hundreds of human beings on a daily basis.

Kenma didn’t care; his job consisted basically in serving drinks to people in a hurry, too busy minding their own business to pay any real attention to the guy who was serving them. He even liked his co-worker; Hinata Shouyou couldn’t be more different than him, and it was a good thing, because he catalyzed all the attention of the few people bold enough to try to engage conversation at seven in the morning. Shouyou was the only person on the planet able to be cheerful and full of energy at such an early hour, and he never got offended by Kenma’s apathy or lack of response. Actually, he usually spoke enough for both of them.

There were few exceptions to the continuous, wordless bustle in the place. One of them was discussing with Shouyou right then, performing their usual morning routine.

“Good morning, Kageyama-kun!”, Shouyou warbled, already serving the guy his _cold milk no coffee no sugar please shut up_ , as always ignoring the last part of the guy’s daily request. Kageyama grumbled between his teeth some curses in Shouyou’s direction, as he always did, but nevertheless every following morning he would be there once again. 

“How are you today, Kageyama-kun?”

Another grumble.

Kenma served an espresso and a cappuccino to two salarymen completely absorbed by their phones, and starting preparing a latte with caramel for a high-school teacher who came there every morning. Kenma might not be really good at human interaction, but he easily remembered people’s usual orders. He later found out that most people liked when you served them without them needing to say anything, and Kenma had no trouble in memorizing their faces and what they always asked; he didn’t even need to know their names. All the noisy people went to Shouyou in any case.

Kenma hurried to make two espressos for a young couple who had just come in. Shouyou was still engaged in a one-sided conversation with the man called Kageyama, who was definitely taking his time to finish his milk.

“I like your wallpaper”, Shouyou was saying, while Kenma was serving the espressos as the couple reached the counter. They greeted him with a nod; the man hid a yawn behind his hand, and while the woman poured half bowl of sugar in her coffee.

“Don’t nose around my phone, dumbass!”, Kageyama grabbed his phone and smashed it in his pocket.

“Why? I really like it!”, said Shouyou. “My little sister loves Doraemon too!”

Kenma put some dirty cups in the dishwasher and launched it. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kageyama blushing heavily, then slamming the emptied cup on the counter with a bang that reverberated through all the place, suddenly silent.

“Idiot!”, he yelled, catalyzing the attention of the one or two people who weren’t already looking at him. Realizing that, he threw his money beside the cup and left the shop like he had the hell hounds at his heels.

“Did I say something wrong?”, Shouyou asked Kenma, while the shop started to be filled with the usual noises of chatting and phone notifications once again.

Kenma shrugged. “He’ll be back tomorrow anyway”, he replied. “Just ask him”.

“Right”, Shouyou smiled, still unsure, before hurrying to go serve a small group of students who had just occupied one of the few tables.

Kenma shook his head. It was almost eight o’clock, meaning that his shift was short to be unofficially ended. He needed to stay there until half past ten, but the number of costumers always reduced to a very small number past nine, leaving both him and Shouyou a very easy and quiet time before their shift was over.

That was another reason why Kenma enjoyed his job; after the first two or three hours, he could pass the rest of his shift on his phone or playing with his DS, with just one eye on the door in case some random customer would appear. There were really few, mostly students who came there to pass some time between classes. One of them was a young Graphic Design student named Yachi, who could pass hours sat at the counter, drinking chocolate milk and doodling on a sketchbook with a blue pencil. There was also a foreign exchange student named Lev, that had quickly become acquainted with Shouyou, the only one capable of understanding his language, composed of gestures, exclamations sounds and words in mixed Japanese, English (which Hinata didn’t understand) and Russian (which Hinata inexplicably understood better than English). And then there was the weird guy by the window.

He didn’t have a regular schedule Kenma had ever recognized. He could come for three days straight, and then disappear for two weeks; but he always arrived early in the morning, taking the table in the corner, just beside the window, and ordered Earl Grey, no milk, raw sugar.

Kenma prepared it for him and gave it to Shouyou, who was in charge of the tables - not really, but it became their usual routine, with Shouyou taking care of the tables and Kenma of the dishwasher, and none of them had ever complained about that. The guy usually remained there until the shop would be empty again, and then would leave his money next to the cup and disappear again, maybe until the following day, maybe for an entire week.

Since he always carried a notebook and a pen, Kenma supposed he was a student; Shouyou had tried to ask him once, but he never got a proper answer.

If he was a student, though, he looked like a very lazy one; every time Kenma’s eyes landed in his direction, he always caught him staring into the crowd, or outside the window, his notebook opened on the table in front of him with the pen upon it, lying idle and still. Kenma couldn’t recall having ever seen him writing something.

That day, he was there again. Kenma addressed him a quick glance; he was staring out of the window again, his hand fiddling with his pen, describing arches in the air. 

The guy looked away from the window, and crossed eyes with Kenma for a close instant. He looked away, freeing the counter of the dirty cups of some costumers who had just left. When he looked towards that corner again, the guy was staring out of the window once again, apparently unbothered by the quiet noise of the shop around him.

He was curious. Every customer of the small coffee shop, even those weird ones that Shouyou loved the most, were all connected to a kind of routine Kenma could understand. Coffee before work, cappuccino between shifts, a quick breakfast before the morning class. Some of them chatted with each other, other just played on phone; a student worked with his laptop, and asked permission to charge it every time, even if Shouyou kept reassuring him he didn’t need to ask at all.

The weird guy was just there, with his tea, his untouched notebook, and his pen, glancing around for hours. 

He remained there, while the shop quietly emptied. Kenma found himself glancing in his direction more and more times, but they never crossed eyes anymore. He emptied the dishwasher and put away the clean cups, then filled it with the dirty ones. There was little work for him at that point; the shop was completely empty except for the guy at the table and Yachi at the counter, who was drinking a big glass of chocolate milk, listening about how Kageyama had been “rude” and “a dumbass” for calling Shouyou an idiot in front of the entire shop just because he had complimented his screensaver. “I mean, I _liked_ it”, Shouyou was explaining, while Yachi was nodding, her mouth dirty with milk cream. “I even can sing the opening. But no- he _needed_ to call me an idiot just because I tried to have some normal conversation-”

“Shouyou, the tables”, said Kenma. More customers could come in, and all the free tables were currently a mess of dirty cups and napkins.

“-and then he slammed the cup on the counter so hard I’m sure he broke it. The counter, I mean, not the cup. So, so hard-”

Yachi nodded intensely.

“Shouyou”, Kenma tried again. “The tables”.

“-and left without saying a word. I swear, everybody was looking at him. And then at me. Like it was my fault”.

Kenma gave up. He took an empty tray and a dishcloth and went across the room, as Shoyou was asking a concerned Yachi if she thought Kageyama would never come there again.

“I’m sure he will be back tomorrow”, the girl replied with a smile. Shouyou’s concernment would be more realistic if the same scene hadn’t already repeated plenty of times in the past. 

Kenma reached the first table, and picked up the dirty glasses and the napkins, passing the dishcloth to clean a coffee stain. Aside from Shouyou’s ramblings, the shop was so quiet he could even hear the background music, which they usually kept at minimum because no-one liked it in the early mornings, their boss had said.

As he finished the first table, he saw the guy move from his spot, heading towards the door. He had picked up his notes and bag, and closed his jacket up to his chin. Kenma lifted his gaze, and their eyes met as the guy passed by him. The guy nodded to Kenma as a greeting, and then walked out to the cold, gray morning. Kenma nodded back, even if the guy could no longer see him, then moved from his cleaned table to the next one.

Shouyou was still stuck in the middle of his monologue; Yachi was nodding so energetically Kenma wondered if she would get a crick in the neck.

“And the other day”, Shouyou was saying, his loud voice reverberating through the entire shop, “he’d told me he’s never met someone as annoying as me. Really. Straight to my face”.

“But he still came back the following day, didn’t he?”, Yachi smiled, and took a sip of her milk.

“Yeah”, Shouyou muttered, his ranting turned off in the blink of an eye. “He did”. He sounded confused. 

Kenma smiled. He approached the last table.

He collected the empty cup. As he put it on the trail, a napkin fell from the plate, folded in four. Kenma picked it up to throw it in the trash; his hand stopped mid-air, as he saw the black signs of kanji carved in transparency through the paper.

Out of curiosity, he put the trail down, and unfolded the napkin. 

There was one word, written by pressing the pen on the paper so hard Kenma had been able to see it engraved from the other side. _STRINGS_ , it was written, and then erased it with a neat, black line. Just a little below, in smaller letters, it was written _All around._

Kenma lifted his eyes, looking at the now empty table and at the door, almost expecting to see the guy come back in to take it back.

But when the door opened, a man in a suit entered instead. Kenma had never seen him before, but he recognized the type: red cheeks, heavy breath, eyes that hurried to the watch on his wrist in the exact second he entered the shop. That meant “really late for a meeting, but need coffee nevertheless”. Kenma put the napkin in his apron’s pocket and hurried to serve him at the counter. Nine times out of ten, people like those could become mean if they’re forced to wait.

 

Napkin #12

_A rainy day, a change in the routine-_

_How the tables turned._

[October]

 

Kenma had been working there for almost six months, but he couldn’t remember at all if the guy had always been coming there, or when exactly the table on the corner had started to be “that guy’s place”. He found himself wondering about that more and more after collecting that small napkin in his pocket.

Kenma had never had trouble memorizing faces and drinks when people went there every day, at the same hour, and ordered the same thing over and over. Even Shouyou, who had been hired two months after Kenma, had ended up memorizing them, even if he almost only remembered about the people he used to chat with. 

The silent ones had always been Kenma’s business; similar souls are attracted to each other, Yachi had said once, but Kenma was sure that it was simply that most of the people just hated morning chatting.

He didn’t remember that guy. He shook his head, as he prepared two cappuccinos - one with soy milk - for a couple of high school students barely hiding heavy yawns behind their gloved fingers.

His hands could do the work by themselves, while his mind traveled through all his memories of his first days of work, while his eyes ran at the door every time it opened to the noise of the street outside.

Everything had seemed just too much back then. Yaku, the guy that worked there before Shouyou, had been a huge help for him during his first days, giving Kenma some tips about how to deal with the worst customers, like the ones that wanted him to know exactly what they wanted, even if he was a new employee and he hadn’t seen them once before.

When Yaku left, Kenma had been scared that he new co-worker would be awful - but Shouyou was okay. Sometimes, Kenma thought he could truly call him a friend.

For his first weeks, he was too focused on how to communicate properly and how to not mess everything up, he could barely look at the people that came in. Day by day, he started to recognize more and more of them, and what they ordered and how they liked it, even the weirdest requests.

Somewhere between those weeks, he got used to preparing Shouyou a big cup of hot Earl Grey tea for the table in the corner. It hadn’t been regular, it had never been regular, so Kenma couldn’t remember if he had been there before Shouyou started shouting tea orders in his direction. Similarly, he couldn’t remember when he started to notice him, when he started to be aware of him being there, staring into the void or out of the window; he couldn’t remember when he started to be interested in him.

Because he was, Kenma admitted to himself. Everyone else, every regular customer, every person that stopped by for a quick coffee or for a cappuccino with a slice of cake, was crystal clear to Kenma’s eyes, sooner or later. Everyone came there for a reason, would it be a quick stop before a meeting or a well-deserved break between classes.

He couldn’t say the same for the guy, and despite everything, he was curious. 

He eventually came back after three days. Kenma had been labeled him as “the guy” in his head for days, mostly because he hadn’t got a clue about which his name was, nor he had any other way to call him. He came in as the coffee shop started to get crowded. As usual, almost any of the tables was taken, and the small one in the corner was empty, as it had been waiting for him.

Kenma finished to pour two espressos into paper cups and a minute later, a cup of Earl Grey tea was ready on a tray for Shouyou to pick it up.

Kenma’s eyes went to that corner so many times that day until the moment in which he almost put hot water instead of milk in a latte; he cleared his mind and forced himself to stay more focused on his job. But, for how many times he glanced in his direction, once again, he never caught him writing in his notebook.

The shop started to get so crowded both him and Shouyou needed to run from one side to the other of the counter to manage to serve everyone. Yachi had come and managed to find a seat at the counter after five minutes of vain tries, and was currently surrounded by four salarymen in a suit that towered on her like oaks next to a small, holly tree.

The hint of a smile touched Kenma’s lips, immediately shut off by an even larger group of High School students that stormed in with their uniforms and their usual orders of milkshake and flavored hot chocolates.

When they were finally allowed to breath again, all the tables in the shop were empty, included the one he was interested in. Once again, he anticipated Shouyou and went to clear them by himself. He didn’t really think he would find another message, or whatever it was, but he was curious to see if there would be one for real.

His friend didn’t complain; and he suspected he wouldn’t do it unless he asked him to deal with the dishwasher in his place.

With his tray full of dirty cups, he approached the last table. He collected the tea cup, and one more time, a napkin, half folded, half-crumpled, stuck between the cup and the plate.

Kenma glanced at it, surprised that it was there for real, once again with the small traces of the ink visible trough the thin paper. He put it in his apron’s pocket and came back towards the counter. He opened it after emptying the dishwasher. That time, there were two lines of writing, both in the same messy, small calligraphy.

_A phone call - unknown number._

_Would you pick up?_

Kenma frowned. That made even less sense than the first one. It was little likely they were meant for someone to read. But why writing them in the first place? He shook his head; it was only one more question for a list he didn’t even realize he was writing up.

He came back to his duties, waiting for the shop to be completely empty to check his phone and play some games.

 

Napkin #20

_The footprints on the ground don’t tell you’ve been here._

_It’s the shadow you left behind that tells me you’re still here._

[November]

 

Kenma fell in a usual routine without even realizing it. The guy kept coming there without any schedule he could recognize. But he kept coming there nevertheless, drinking his tea, glancing around, and- he still never caught him actually writing something. His questions multiplied as the napkins in his pockets did; the guy kept leaving them, and he kept collecting them, even if he probably wasn’t supposed to, and didn’t know what to do with them.

Sometimes he re-read one of two of them, trying to find a string that connected them all, but finding none.

Kenma didn’t know enough about literature to be able to understand a hypothetical hidden secret behind those sentences. Maybe Kuroo could, but Kenma was reluctant to involve his friend into that. It wasn’t like he had the right to share those little pieces of paper with anyone else; he wasn’t sure he had the right to keep them for himself either. The guy left them on the table, sometimes folded, more often crumpled, left for him or Shouyou to throw them in the trash - which was probably what his co-worker had done for Gods knew how many weeks. It was very unlikely they had been left there for someone - anyone - to collect them as he had done day after day.

Kenma had considered many times the idea to throw them away and stop bothering about that; he always ended up to keep them in his pocket. It would be like throwing away pieces of someone else’s life.

He kept them, and waited for a chance to ask his questions; the right circumstance, however, never happened.

Kenma had never really wished to be different than he was, but sometimes he thought about how some things in his life would be easier if he was a little more like Shouyou, who could talk to anyone, from a man in a suit to a little kid met on the street, with little concern about the consequences. It had been a long time since he had lingered in that kind of thoughts, almost since he was a kid and he didn’t understand why it was so hard to him to talk and play with others like everyone else did. For the first time in forever, he wished that he wouldn’t be so hard for him to just go there and speak to who he wanted to speak. He wasn’t even shy; he just wasn’t the kind of guy able to break any sort of ice.

He waited day after day after day, looking at all his chances slipping away from his hands, his curiosity growing as a rational part of his mind told it to shut up.

 

Napkin #29

_I’m scared_

_To not have enough time_

_To see the changes in my own reflection_

[December]

 

Autumn passed, and so did winter. The guy didn’t appear during all the Christmas holidays; without students, the place was quieter than usual, despite Shouyou had adorned it like it was a fucking mall to “call more customers in”. Kenma doubted that someone would’ve woken up at 6 AM during a break to come there just because they’d put Christmas lights on the counter, but Shouyou was so excited about it that he had even involved Yachi and Lev - and a very reluctant Kageyama, who yelled at him for half an hour while he helped them with the decorations - and Kenma had had no heart to speak against it in the end.

 

He came back in January, the day after Shouyou, following Kenma’s endless requests, had made the shop return to its original shape. The usual routine of a business day had started again, and the guy took his usual place like the festivities had never happened. Kenma glanced at him as he entered the shop, and the guy greeted him with a nod as their eyes met. That had become a habit for both of them in the last weeks, but still counted as the only interaction they’d ever had. Kenma guessed it was his turn to make one step further, being him the one interested in doing that, but he couldn’t find any chance - better: he couldn’t exploit any chance he had. He forced his mind away from curiosity, as he did every time; focusing on his job was a better choice, and an easier one. 

The day passed as usual, and as usual, the guy left as the crowd in the shop got thinner and thinner. Kenma took care of the tables - it had slowly become his usual task, even in the days in which the guy hadn’t been there - looking for one more written napkin as he went for some hidden treasure, or a new episode of an intriguing TV show.

That time, it was folded and put under the cup; Kenma collected it and put it in his pocket, and came back to the counter. Benefitting from the lack of customers, he carefully opened it. Small sentences were written in the usual, black ink.

 

_The end is in the mirror._

_I see it, it sees me back through my eyes._

_I see, I feel, I understand._

_I call time._

 

Kenma kept staring at the kanji on the irregular surface of the napkin. He turned it, but there was nothing on the other side except the ugly print of their coffee brand logo.

He turned it again to read the words. His gaze run at the guy’s usual spot and then on the street, but obviously, he was nowhere in sight; Kenma couldn’t even tell at what time he had left. 

He read the words one more time, trying to understand any secret meaning that wasn’t that negative. Those words could mean anything. It wasn’t like all the previous ones Kenma had stolen away from that table had ever made any sense to him.

They probably had some meaning for the guy that Kenma didn’t understand, that he couldn’t understand. He kept saying that to himself over and over, but struggled to keep those words away from his mind for the rest of the day.

_The end is in the mirror._

He charged the dishwasher and switched it on.

_I call time._

 

The guy didn’t appear again for three full weeks. Kenma had counted the days, as his worry became anxiety, and is anxiety became some sort of resignation. It was hard for him to stay rational when there was no way for all his questions to find an answer, even if he knew he could only blame himself for that.

Shouyou had noticed that something was off with him, but Kenma didn’t want to talk about that, not even to him. It wasn’t easy to explain how he felt, and why he felt like that, because there was absolutely nothing rational about that, and the more Kenma realized it, the more confused he felt, the more difficult he would’ve been to explain it with words.

_I don’t know him_ , Kenma had tried to tell to an imaginary spokesman. _But it’s like I do. I peaked in his life. I stole his napkins._ Okay, maybe he didn’t exactly steal them, but most time he felt like he did. _It’s like I have part of his life in my pocket, even if I don’t know what it means, nor why he always threw them away. I’d just want to have the chance to ask him_.

But the guy kept not coming. It wouldn’t have been worrisome at all if his last “message” wouldn’t be that negative to Kenma’s eyes. It wasn’t the only one with a negative message. There were others. Other ones seemed positive. Other ones, they simply didn’t have any meaning Kenma could understand. Once again, he tried to connect the dots, once again he failed.

When he finally came back, Kenma didn’t hesitate anymore.

He saw him entering the shop, already half-full of early customers, quiet chatting, and sound of phones. He finished preparing the coffee before preparing a tea pot of Earl Grey, no milk, raw sugar. He put it on a tray, and walked past Shouyou, who had already reached out with his hands to take it. “Take care of the counter”, Kenma said, and without waiting for a reply, he walked through the crowded place towards the table in the corner.

If the guy had been surprised to see him instead of Shouyou, he didn’t show that. He lifted his gaze from his blank notebook, and gave him a smile.

“How are you?”, Kenma blurted, hastily.

The pale smile on the guy’s face slowly faded away, replaced by a confused expression. “I’m fine, thank you”, he replied, cautious, probably in response to Kenma’s blunt tone.

Knowing that he owed him an explanation, but _not_ knowing exactly how to put it in words, Kenma put the tray down, and his hand went to his pocket to pull out that last napkin. He unfolded it, and smoothed the paper on the guy’s notebook for him to read.

He looked down at the small piece of paper with his own words written on it, and then at Kenma. 

He waited for him to say something. He wasn’t sure he wouldn’t have just told him to mind his own business and stay away from him, but for getting at least one answer, it was worth trying.

“You kept it”, the guy said. He didn’t seem angry. Just surprised. “Why?”

Kenma shrugged. “I don’t know”.

The guy didn’t look annoyed by his answer. Instead, he kept staring at him, in a way Kenma would find uncomfortable. Except that he didn’t.

“I didn’t keep only this one”, he added, since the guy didn’t ask any more questions. “I have more. I just-”, he didn’t know what to say. Did he need to explain? Probably yes. He wanted an explanation from him, but at first, he owed the guy one.

“KENMA!”, Shouyou screamed from the counter, so loud that they’d probably heard him on the street outside. He turned to look at him. “Help me!”, he mouthed, wavering towards the crowd that was surrounding him.

Kenma sighed, and turned towards the guy again. “In two hours, everything will be quieter”, he said, unsure. The guy was still staring at him, calm. “I’ll have more time, then for”, he hesitated, “answers”. From both of them, he guessed.

The guy nodded, without changing expression. “I’ll be waiting”. 

Kenma nodded, and without adding anything else, he recollected his tray and run back towards the counter; he wasn’t sure if he was less anxious, or more anxious than before.

...

The guy’s name was Akaashi Keiji. He told Kenma before he could ask him anything.

Kenma said his name, then waited for questions that didn’t come. The guy- Akaashi was still sitting in front of his blank notebook and empty cup, this time his gaze was on Kenma instead of wandering around the now empty room.

His hands were playing with the napkin Kenma had given him, smoothing it with his fingers, then crumpling it again.

Kenma always struggled to find the right words, but that time he made an effort, he wanted to make an effort. “I don’t know why I kept them”, he said, without preambles. He had always considered them a waste of time. “I just thought-”, he choked a sigh, trying to find any words to describe his reasons, “it wasn’t right to throw them away”, he concluded.

Akaashi nodded at his weak excuses, like they actually made sense to him. “Maybe you’re right”, he simply said.

Kenma stared at him back. Somehow, Akaashi’s gaze didn’t make him uncomfortable like other people’s did. Kenma didn’t feel like he was being judged.

“Why did you throw them away?”, he asked, without thinking it twice. “What do they mean?”

Akaashi gave him a pale smile. “Do they mean anything to you?”

“No”, Kenma said, sincere.

Akaashi nodded. “But you kept them”.

“Just because I can’t understand them, it didn’t mean they meant nothing”, Kenma said. “Can I ask you a thing?” Akaashi nodded again. “Why do you write on napkins? Why not on a notebook?” _And why do you throw them away_ , he wanted to add, but he didn’t. He hated when people asked him too many questions at once.

“Because I need something to start with”. He shook his head, and smiled. “If it does make sense”.

“Something like a word?”, Kenma asked.

“More like an idea”, Akaashi said. “A good one. A one I wouldn’t throw away”. His hand smoothed the surface of the napkin once again.

“Are you a writer?”

Akaashi was. And he wasn’t. A _ghost writer,_ he told Kenma, and he had needed him to explain what it meant. He had already heard the word, but couldn’t connect him to a proper job.

So, Akaashi _was_ a writer, but under someone else’s name. “Mostly, for quick biographies on the net”, he told Kenma. His shift had basically ended, and he could see Shouyou directing him wide, mute gestures from the counter. He ignored him. “And articles. Like, receipts for books, you know”.

Kenma didn’t know. “And you need ideas for that?”

Akaashi shook his head. “Not for that. You don’t really need ideas for _that_. On the other hand, you better not think at all, and just do what you’re told to do”, his hands fiddled with his teaspoon. “I think your friend is calling you”, he informed Kenma.

It started to become hard to ignore Shouyou at that point. Kenma sighed. “You want another cup of tea?”, he asked Akaashi. “My trade”.

The guy nodded, and waited at his table as Kenma came back to the counter and said goodbye to Shouyou, ignoring his questions - he knew that if he answered only one of them, a storm of other would’ve kept him busy for almost an hour - and came back three minutes later with Earl Grey for Akaashi and hazelnut coffee for himself.

...

After that first time, in which they remained at the table until the shop started to get crowded again for the lunch ship, Kenma had developed the habit of joining him whenever he was there. Not that his schedule had become more regular than it previously had been.

“It depends on work”, Akaashi had answered to him. “I usually work at home, or at the library. I need to access the internet for the information”. Sometimes his work lasted days, sometimes just a morning. Rarely more than a week, he explained.

“And you never write at home?”, asked Kenma.

“I can’t”, Akaashi replied. “Too many distractions”.

Kenma frowned. He couldn’t understand how someone could be more distracted at home than he was in a crowded place. He didn’t ask him, but Akaashi somehow read the question on his face.

“There’s too many things I could do at home”, he explained. “And once you got distracted, it’s a challenge to focus again. Here I can just focus on what I have to do, or focus on the people around me”, he gave a quick smile. “Listening to people helps”.

Kenma nodded, even if he didn’t really understand. At least he knew how he always saw him glancing around, or out of the window. “And why people help?”, he asked.

“People are stories”, Akaashi said. “That’s what I’m looking for”.

...

Two weeks later, he finally asked him about the napkins again. That first time, Akaashi had glossed over the answer, and Kenma didn’t want to insist. But what he wanted to know was if the guy was bothered by the fact that he had kept them. That he was still keeping them.

Akaashi said he wasn’t.

“You said they’re ideas”, Kenma tried again.

“More or less”, he tilted his head, and gave Kenma a pale smile. “You can ask, if you want”.

Kenma was grateful he had said that out loud, like he had given him a formal permission. “Like this one”, Kenma pulled out the first one he had ever collected, and put it in front of Akaashi. He stared at it, hinted a smile, shook his head. His hands smoothed the paper, old by weeks, with the ink already a little faded. His gaze lingered on the napkin. “I remember that day”, he said. He looked back at Kenma. “The strings”, he hesitated, “aren’t exactly an idea. Or better, I thought they could be something to start with. But they’re”, he shrugged, “something else”.

Kenma didn’t reply, waiting for Akaashi to go on, if he wanted to. “The strings are all the stories I wanted to write”, he said, after a longer pause. “All the ideas I wanted to put on paper”, he hesitated again, brought the cup of tea to his lips, then put it down without drinking. “So, this is my paper”, he touched his notebook, “and there are strings. A lot of strings”. He interweaved his fingers. “All tangled. All in the same color. I can’t see how many they are, I can’t find where they begin or end. They’re just there. The more I struggle, the more they tangle together. The larger the void around them become”. He sighed. “The more my pages remain blank”. He shook his head. “Sorry. It doesn’t really make sense”.

It didn’t, but Kenma could grasp the point at least.

“So the last one wasn’t some sort of dying message?”

Akaashi gave a small laugh. “No”, he shook his head. “No. No, sorry, it isn’t funny at all”. 

Kenma could even think it was funny, from that side of the events, but back them he hadn’t thought that at all. “No. I don’t even remember what I was thinking at the moment. It was nothing really important, or I wouldn’t throw it away”.

“I like it”, Kenma said. “I don’t really understand what you meant back then. But you used metaphors a lot. Some metaphors you used”, he shrugged, “I really liked them”.

Akaashi looked at him, surprised, but with a smile lingering on his lips. “Thank you”, his smile grew wider. “You really kept them”.

“You should’ve”, Kenma retorted, a little too blunt. “I mean”, he hesitated, as Akaashi glanced at him with curiosity. “I can’t understand why you threw them away”.

Kenma knew that he was probably stepping out of his boundaries, but for once he didn’t care.

Akaashi breathed, and took some time before replying. “They’re not only ideas”, he eventually said. “Sometimes they’re just random thoughts. Memories. Impressions. Everything that sounds good in my mind”. He kept smoothing that napkin like he wanted to erase the words traced on it. “But when I write them down, they don’t sound good anymore”.

“Why”, Kenma asked.

Akaashi hesitated again. “Because they all sound plain and”, he glanced at the napkin under his fingers, “trivial”.

Kenma’s thoughts went to all the messages - ideas - he had collected in his pockets during those weeks. He still couldn’t say he understood them, but they brought his attention nevertheless. They did for sure.

“Maybe it’s because you’re the one thinking them”, he said to Akaashi. “Of course they sound trivial to you”.

He gave a small laugh. “I wish it was that easy”.

Kenma frowned. _Wasn’t it?_ Suddenly he was a little kid again, his eyes and mind fixated on a problem he didn’t know how to solve - and then Kuroo was there, insisting in asking what was it about until Kenma would give up and tell him. It didn’t really make him feel better like his friend always said, but sometimes Kuroo had been able to look at his problems through perspectives Kenma hadn’t considered at all- and in that way, yes, he had made things easier for him.

Kenma still thought he wasn’t the best person to give advice on that matter, but, if it had helped _him_ on all people, he could really work to anyone.

“Maybe it’s just”, he tried, looking for the right words, “maybe it’s really just that you’re the only one who read them. Maybe you should just write them all down, and let someone read them, and ask them what they think”, he concluded, weakly.

Akaashi looked at him. “Guess it’s what I’ve already done”, he said.

Kenma stared back, caught by surprise. “Well, I mean _properly_ write them”, he argued. “On a notebook, for someone to read”. He looked at the blank page under Akaashi’s hands. “You never write anything there”.

“I don’t”, Akaashi said, apparently unbothered by Kenma’s bluntness. “I still don’t have anything to start with”.

Kenma shook his head, and without thinking it over, he went for his pocket, and pulled out all the napkins he could grab. He put them on the notebook. “You do”.

Akaashi stared at them, then back at Kenma. “Would you help me?”

Kenma started. _Me?_ , Kenma thought. _Why me_ , he wanted to ask. _I don’t think I can_ , he wanted to say, _I don’t know what to do_.

“Yes”, Kenma said.

Akaashi smiled.

...

“Sorry”, Akaashi pulled away the notebook from Kenma’s hands, “it’s a mess”.

It was. Akaashi had a messy handwriting, as he had already known from the napkins, but still easy to read. Kenma had been able to see a lot of erased words and a few highlighted ones before Akaashi closed the notebook again with a sigh.

He had tried to put the words down, as Kenma had suggested him two days before. He had given him all his napkins back - Akaashi wouldn’t have asked, Kenma knew, but he insisted that he should take them anyway. “You can throw them away for real, if you want”, Kenma had said. “But they’re yours”.

Akaashi had glanced at him. “I can’t throw them away now”.

Kenma hadn’t replied, and cleaned the table from the dirty cups as the other guy prepared to leave.

Akaashi had read them all, he told him. He had put them in a plastic envelope and returned them to Kenma.

“I’ve written them down”, he had told him, and then showed him the first pages of his notebook, filled with words connected with arrows, cuts, and corrections. "That's why it's a mess", he sighed.

“It’s okay”, Kenma said, “when the mess is on the paper, it’s not in your head”.

Akaashi stared at him for a moment, then laughed. He had a clear laugh, that brought a smile on Kenma’s lips too, and then he found himself laughing together with him.

“Guess you’re right”, Akaashi said.

Kenma smiled at him, then he needed to come back to work, after a bunch of young guys entered in a hurry, probably looking for a shelter from the rain that had been falling since the morning. The shower had brought to the shop more customers than usual even after the early hours, so Kenma didn’t have much time for chatting. He regretted that a little. He had started to really enjoy his chats with Akaashi, even if they were never regular, and often interrupted by some customer that rushed in, or by Shouyou waving in his direction to get help. It seemed to have been ages since the times in which he didn’t know how to talk to him, or he still thought that Akaashi would have told him to mind his business and leave him alone.

He was starting to wish for those stolen moments. He didn’t want to give them up.

He was busy emptying the dishwasher when he saw Akaashi walking towards him, his jacket on, as usually buttoned up to his chin, an umbrellaunderarm. “I need to go”, he said to Kenma, “I have an errand in half an hour”, he waved a quick goodbye with his hand. “See you?”

“See you”, Kenma said back, and gave him a little smile while he slowly walked away from the shop. He kept looking at him through the glass of the door, as he struggled with opening the umbrella against the wind and the rain, and then walking away.

He sighed. He could at least have brought his dirty cup to the counter, he thought, as he walked through the shop to clean the table.

As he picked up the cup, a small napkin fell from the plate, folded in four. Without holding back a smile, Kenma pulled it up, too curious to see what he had written on it to wait to come back at the counter.

This time, there were just two, short words. _Call me_ , Akaashi had written; underneath, he had scribbled a phone number. There was an interrogation mark too, after the words, but Akaashi had cut it away with a neat line.

Kenma smiled, and suddenly even that cold, rainy day seemed bright and warm. He put the napkin in his pocket, wondering when the shop will be quiet enough for him to pull out his phone.

**Author's Note:**

> This was shorter in my mind and also made more sense.  
> Of course, Kenma will be getting a date way before Hinata and Kageyama will stop yelling at each other from the two sides of the counter. Stay as you are, kitten, you're perfect like this.
> 
> Thanks for reading, hope you liked it!


End file.
